The View From 1776

Lebanese Civilian Casualties

Liberals in Europe and the United States, which of course includes most of the news media, cry crocodile tears over civilian casualties in Lebanon.

We must pray for and sympathize with innocent women and children caught in the crossfire. But we must also remember three points:

First, Hezbollah, a part of the Lebanese government, started the fight by crossing a UN-mandated international border between Israel and Lebanon and attacking an Israeli army unit.

Second, by deliberate design, attacking terrorists like Hezbollah and Hamas without killing and wounding innocent civilians is impossible, because terrorists intermingle their weapons and forces with civilian populations.

Third, as reader Errol Phillips notes, a significant portion of “civilian” casualties reported by the press are actually Hezbollah fighters, who are not uniformed army troops, but technically civilians.